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East Vancouver tent city loses its cooking, heating source

Author of the article:

Susan Lazaruk

Publishing date:

November 9, 2017 • 3 minute read

Eagle McGilvery, 20, left, and her sister, Cherise O., 21, live at the tent city off Powell Street in East Vancouver because they don't have homes. They said police and firefighters on Nov. 7 removed all of the camp's propane heaters and stoves due to fire hazards./ PNG

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Firefighters and police officers have confiscated propane heaters, stoves and barbecues from a tent city for the homeless in east Vancouver, leaving the two dozen residents without heat for warmth or cooking.

But at least two residents said they and the others will remain at the campsite across from the sugar refinery and nicknamed Sugar Mountain — a visible sign that the three levels of governments are failing on the affordable-housing file, according to a homeless advocate.

East Vancouver tent city loses its cooking, heating sourceBack to video

“They (the officers) said the propane stove was a fire hazard,” one of the homeless, Cherise, who would only give her last initial, O., said on Wednesday, a day after the raid at the camp near Powell Street and Clark Drive. “They had to go into the tents of the people who weren’t here, and the ones that were locked, they just cut open the tents. And they dug through everyone’s stuff.”

Cherise, 21, said police took her propane stove, while her sister, Eagle McGilvery, 20, said they took her propane heater. The women were among the few people visible at the site Wednesday on an empty corner lot surrounded by a chain-link fence hung with tarps and sleeping bags.

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Inside was a food tent, with bags of bread products, and another area with a grouping of couches not far from a row of portable outhouses.

The two women sat outside their tents surrounded by a scattering of bike parts, skateboards without wheels and shoes, clothing and other household items.

“I don’t know how they expect us to keep warm,” said Cherise, who has been living at the camp since it started up at the end of June.

The Vancouver Fire and Rescue Service confirmed “a small number of officers attended to confiscate items which were in violation of the order” issued earlier this year that banned propane devices, among other directives, said Vancouver city spokeswoman Ellie Lambert in an email.

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The order, dated Sept. 15, ordered residents to cease the use of open flames or flammable heat sources, to place barbecues at least three metres from any tent or building and to take down tarps used as canopies.

“An inspection to determine compliance with this order will be conducted as required,” the order said.

A sign from the fire department at the camp’s entrance warned against combining “tents, tarps and flames,” saying two people in Surrey had been seriously burned Sept. 19 using a heater to stay warm inside a tent.

Lambert also said in the email that the city is working with people at the site to place them into shelters, and so far 10 people have been “rehoused.”

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But Cherise and McGilvery, who said her mother kicked her out of her Surrey home because McGilvery was using drugs, said they’d rather stay at the squat than go to a shelter or a single-room occupancy building.

She said she would like to get a job or return to school to become a social worker, but her life plans are stymied until she has stable housing.

“Unfortunately, homelessness in B.C. has been allowed to worsen over the past number of years with no clear plan in place,” Kate Mukasa, spokeswoman for Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Selina Robinson, said in an email.

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The province is working with Vancouver to provide “600 temporary modular units” to house the homeless, and workers regularly visit homeless camps to offer options and services, she said.

Offering “ATCO trailers” isn’t a solution and indicates the province has no solution for the area’s 3,000 homeless, said J.J. Riach of the Alliance Against Displacement. She accused officials of using the fire-hazard warning as an attempt to force residents into shelters.

Ottawa needs to provide the money to build, the province the operating costs and the city the land, said Riach. Vancouver has to buy back its land that it’s selling to developers who develop it as condos, which further drives up housing and rental costs, she said.

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